Tech Tips

I was chatting with a Windows-using friend recently, and he wanted to
try Linux on one of his older computers. I always like those sorts of
conversations, and so I kept chatting, walking him through setting up
Unetbootin to create a USB installer and so on and so on. Unfortunately, he wasn't
able to get the USB drive to boot. more>>

Sometimes, when the clock hits 3:00am, and you've been in the server
room since 9 o'clock the previous day, you start to get a little
batty. That's the only explanation I have for programs like cowsay
in Linux. Still, I'm glad they're there, because life wouldn't be nearly
as fun without them. Here's a quick list of silly Linux programs off the
top of my head. more>>

I am a visual learner. When I try to teach something, I naturally like
to use visual examples. That usually involves me working for hours to
create flowcharts in Google Docs using the drawing program. Yes, it
works, but it's a very cumbersome way to create a flowchart. Thankfully,
I recently discovered Lucidchart.
more>>

Everyone has wasted an afternoon on YouTube clicking through videos of
talking cats, screaming goats and bad-lip-reading renditions of popular
movies. Heck, there are plenty of YouTube videos of me doing odd and
silly things as well. (Does anyone remember 'Buntu Family Theater?) For
important family videos, however, I much prefer to control my own
data. more>>

No matter how much I love Plex, there's still nothing that comes close
to XBMC for usability when it comes to watching your network media on a
television. I've probably written a dozen articles on Plex during the last
few years, so you know that's tough for me to admit. more>>

Apps like Instagram have made photo filters commonplace. I actually
don't mind the vintage look for quick cell-phone snapshots, but a filter
can do only so much. At first glance, Repix is another one of those
"make your photo cool" apps that does little more than add a border and
change saturation levels. more>>

Portable apps aren't anything new. There are variations of "single
executable apps" for most platforms, and some people swear by keeping
their own applications with them for use when away from home. I don't
usually do that, as most of what I do is on-line, but there is one
exception: security.
more>>

When I wrote about Usenet and Sickbeard a while back, I got many e-mails
that I had broken the first rule of Usenet: don't talk about Usenet. I'm a
sucker for freedom though, and I can't help but share when cool programs
are available. This month, I switched from Sickbeard to NZBDrone for
managing my television shows.
more>>

Setting up Web servers is fairly simple. In fact, it's so simple that
once the server is set up, we often don't think about it anymore. It
wasn't until I had a very large Web site rollout fail miserably that I
started to research a method for load-testing servers before releasing
a Web site to production.
more>>

Although its timetable may not always be ideal, Valve has come through for
Linux users lately. Not only has it released a native Linux version
of Steam (with many native games!), it also has expanded its Linux
support as the basis for its standalone SteamBox. The first step toward
a Steam-powered console is the operating system. more>>

With the recent resurgence of Bitcoin and the subsequent vitality of
other cryptocurrencies (Litecoin, for instance), I've been receiving lots
of e-mail messages asking how to mine. I've discussed cryptocurrencies in
LJ quite a bit
during the past few years. Recently, a friend introduced me to
Anubis, so I want to mention it briefly here.
more>>

My Internet connection is unstable. I do realize ISPs generally claim
some downtime is expected, and service is not guaranteed, and countless
other excuses are common for intermittent service. I currently pay
$120/month for business-class service, however, and I expect to get
reliable Internet access on a regular basis. more>>

It's funny, when your home office is your couch, you tend to forget how
nice it can be when you dock a laptop and have all the extra screen real
estate a monitor brings. For many years, I left my work laptop docked
at work, and when I worked from home, I just VPNed in with a personal
laptop. more>>